Originally posted by N e m e s s i s
Foundations dissolved
by an under whelming sense of
importance, walls tearing and
flaking, dust showering
the rust covered floor. Boards
groaning and clawing with unkempt nails,
the icy tips becoming fingers themselves.
Delusions splinted by a private abyss,
but not gone, it was all just a
whispers stolen by the wind.

I never thought it was circuitous,
onstage with a pen in place of a
tongue, contorting verse to veil its
significance. Suffering, faking, singing all
that’s erroneous until my lungs hold no air,
chocking on my own momentum.
Draped around me, an emotional impediment
clings to my shoulders like an old robe,
deflecting intermittent attempts at rescue,
empathy dangling like a rope thrown to the one
writhing at a well’s foundation.
There I undulate, flailing until the cold
penetrates, merges with what’s already erratic.
And on that stage I saunter from side to side,
front to back, ranting, piercing air with every
momentous message, finger slicing like a guillotine,
head estranged and with it all intelligence.
And I recite, lost in meaning

. . . How unfair that the truth was hidden,
faded, but never quite completely.
Then I press and it’s all laid upon me,
rupturing my single hope and dream. A
scavenger leech sucking, draining,
but the hemophiliac doesn’t die, the
parasite a monument to ineffectiveness . . .

The crowd cheers and claps upon the
curtain close, fabric isolating me, but
I can still hear them mumbling. Later they’ll
bow and rest their lips upon my feet
and remind me of just how disconnected
I’ve become;
talent not a gift but a plague.

This is so sad ... and it is so nicely done. An artist life in frustration. Hmm .. I hope I will not end up thinking like that someday.

Quote:

Originally posted by N e m e s s i s

Only Us
By John Loreth

I could spend years
tracing your footsteps and never lose
sight of their uniqueness.
Time is gathered like verse,
veiled and bound as is the rest, but somehow
more alive,
heart and soul forever reminded of the
implications. This stanza will join the
rest, singing sweetly in your testament as
memories recompile until they shine again.
It’s dreams of which I speak.
Truth is but a silhouette there;
I can have you like I’ve always wanted to:
lying forehead to forehead with my finger
crossing the majestic valleys of your lips,
grass prickling our sides, poking
like youth and pleading for attention.
But I have none to spare, it has
all be stolen by eyes and hair.
Lost in brown, tranced by a single wish
when finally lips unite, gently, slowly caressing
like my hand which has wondered to your neck.
Inhaling, exhaling; breathing
you in to show you how I feel inside.
And above a fugitive leaf breaks
free and flutters
from an oak, landing just beside us,
but we’ll never notice.
The world has moved on
leaving only us behind.

Time is gathered like verse,
veiled and bound as is the rest,
but somehow more alive,
heart and soul forever reminded of the implications.

This verse just hit a chord in my hear ... I can't help but shed a tear to its truth.

once I read a novel from the author Orson Scott Card.
The title was "Song Bird"

It was a very sad story but one that inspires.
About a man that creates musics in a unique way.
But one day was containminated and wrote songs differently.
He was forbiden to write again.
But wrote he did because he was who he was.
They punished bim by taking away his sights, voice, and hands
but it never stoped him from making music.
Ultimately they just killed him.

---
Do not let others make you feel less than what you are.
If you believe in something strong enough, just do it.
---

Here is something for your soul

: Broken

Like so many things a mirror
Reflecting what we say and do
Like so many things a mirror
easily broken and never renew

A person is so much like a mirror
you do what you see others do
some say it was original
to me it is just people without a clue

But so like a mirror it seems
that people are broken too
shattering their lifes beliefs
when bitter truths are rocks
that hurls itself unto you

What is then a broken mirror to do?
Do you lie there in pieces?
Do you just fade away silently?
Or pick up the broken parts and go on
using what little is left
to reflect on others what you now see differently
because of a broken mirror's truth.

OK its not poetry but its written so well it might as well be.
It you've ever seen this just this piece performed in person...
it is fantastic.

O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend
The brightest heaven of invention,
A kingdom for a stage, princes to act,
And monarchs to behold the swelling scene!
Then should the warlike Harry, like himself,
Assume the port of Mars; and at his heels,
Leash'd in like hounds, should famine, sword, and fire,
Crouch for employment. But pardon, gentles all,
The flat unraised spirits that hath dar'd
On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth
So great an object. Can this cockpit hold
The vasty fields of France? Or may we cram
Within this wooden O the very casques
That did affright the air at Agincourt?
O, pardon! since a crooked figure may
Attest in little place a million;
And let us, ciphers to this great accompt,
On your imaginary forces work.
Suppose within the girdle of these walls
Are now confin'd two mighty monarchies,
Whose high upreared and abutting fronts
The perilous narrow ocean parts asunder.
Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts:
Into a thousand parts divide one man,
And make imaginary puissance;
Think, when we talk of horses, that you see them
Printing their proud hoofs i' th' receiving earth;
For 'tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings,
Carry them here and there, jumping o'er times,
Turning th' accomplishment of many years
Into an hour-glass; for the which supply,
Admit me Chorus to this history;
Who prologue-like, your humble patience pray
Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play.

Prologue
Henry V

Now is the time for all good Americans to come to the aid of their Country

Originally posted by N e m e s s i s then i will explain. 1st (and proabably the worst reason) is that it has been forced down my throat from years of schooling. 2ndly i hear all this talk about his poems being deceptively simple and i think this is a load of crap, much of the metaphor and symbolism taken from a poem is put there by the reader. granted the writer does use these but the ways i have heard frost's poems explained it was just reaching for something, anything to give it meaning. finally as one poet to another, frost and I are at totaly other ends of the court. I prefer lost of metaphor and syombolism and drama and he goes for simple little stanzas.

i guess its just a preference.

dylan thomas . . . now there's a poet.

Those are all good points, but personally, I enjoy simple word structure. To each his own, I suppose.

Sorry for the silence in the last two days, was back in my home town and I made it a point not to be on the net during those times.

I see that we have some new people among us in the thread and contributing, thank you and welcomed.

Xerxes, your poem is a bit out of my league but it was a nice reading. Would you care to explain it for me a little? It is part of a play is it?

Namloos, wow ... is that the first thing that comes to mind when you wrote the poem? if it is, then you portray your struggles very vividly. I do hope that you keep on writting, because I found that writing poems releases the tension in our lives, and gives us hope and meaning to follow on. Sometimes, death is not the only way out.

As for the poetic discussion of frost's 'Road less Traveled', well, I find that it is a bit of a challenge to decide whether his poem is as good as they say. I have read the poem a long time ago, and during that time, it did not hold much meaning to me, but today while reading it again, it seems different but profoundly familiar, because I can see the link to the words in my heart.

Personally, I feel any poem that can ignite a fire of passion and thoughts are poems that are good. Because in my humble opinion, that is what litterature is about. Art is about making people feel and dream and link with it, it is almost like a relationship between two people.

I understand where Nemesis is going with his thoughts, and I agree with him on some terms, we are all different and have different preference. He like decisive poetry where the meaning of a poem is not so open to interpretation, the poems must mean exactly what the poet wants us to see and hear. Poems like these are clear and to the point, it gives a sense of ONE-ness when it is being read.

Where 'The Road Less Traveled' lets the readers put their experience or meaning into the words, in whatever way that feel it to be. It has its merits, but is totally based on the readers experience in life. Like me, when I first read it, it had no visible link to my life, but now after some ups and down, where tears are found, his words does bring out those memories, because those are what I feel and he successfully pull those strings.

The richness of a poems words are sometimes dilutted because of the experience of the poets wisdom and experience, thus for whatever reason that might be, a poem will live and die by the poets hands.

If you look at it, even the method that frost wrote his poems can be explained with this particular poems of his, he took the road less traveled and made people think about it. Does that mean the poem has only one meaning to it? No, it is open to interpretation, it is up to us to feel what we feel using these 'simple' words, where millions have read and felt differently everytime they read it.

ROAD LESS TRAVELED

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth

Then took the other as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet, knowing how way leads onto way
I doubted if I should ever come back

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence
Two roads diverged in a wood
And I took the one less traveled by
And that has made all the difference

Ok.. here's a song not a poem but hey who would of known
This is not my work but I will post one of my own as soon as I finish it. I'm also typing this from memory so there may be errors...hehe
I really like the lyrics in this song..

Sunburn By Fuel

The sky was dark this morning
Not a bird in the trees
And silence hung suspicious and anxious
Like a blanket covered scream
And you were gone
You were not there for me
And I cursed the sky and begged the sun to
Fall all over me
This life's not living, baby
Living ain't free
If I can't find my way back to me
Let the sun fall down over me
Let the sun fall down
All my friends are searching
Quiet, desperately
Look into their eyes you'll see the faithless crying
Save me, save me, save me
And what are they to feel
And who are they to be
And what am I to do with, do with me, but let the sun
Fall all over me
This life's not living, baby
Living ain't free
If I can't find my way back to me
Let the sun fall down over me
Let the sun fall down
Until my eyes cry out
'Til my head is free from doubt
'Til my lungs sigh right out
'Til I'm wiser
Let the sun
Fall all over me
This life's not living, baby
Living ain't free
If I can't find my way back to me
Let the sun fall down over me
Let the sun fall down

Originally posted by N e m e s s i s then i will explain. 1st (and proabably the worst reason) is that it has been forced down my throat from years of schooling. 2ndly i hear all this talk about his poems being deceptively simple and i think this is a load of crap, much of the metaphor and symbolism taken from a poem is put there by the reader. granted the writer does use these but the ways i have heard frost's poems explained it was just reaching for something, anything to give it meaning. finally as one poet to another, frost and I are at totaly other ends of the court. I prefer lost of metaphor and syombolism and drama and he goes for simple little stanzas.

i guess its just a preference.

dylan thomas . . . now there's a poet.

People always over-analyze writings. Isaac Asimov once sat through a modern writing class. In this class, the professor was explaining the metaphors and meanings found in one of Asimov's books. After the class, Asimov introduced himself to the professor and said that he wasn't thinking any of those things when he wrote the book, nor was he trying to embed any of them as hidden meanings. The professor replied with something along the lines of "Maybe you don't know what you were thinking when you wrote the book."

Anyway . . .

Longest English word
is antidisestablish-
mentarianism

For the freedom to express myself in my own way without fear of being censored or banned.